For Those Of You Benighted Enough To Live Beyond These Shores -
Allow me to explain that the Anglo-Saxon slang "Bung" does not refer to the cork in a cask, nor yet to the bribe in a billfold, but instead to the act of hurling an object into the middle distance. Hurling, curling or welly-wanging in other dialects and sports, for your information. Art!
Using fizzicks and syns
Your Humble Scribe, as you should so surely know by now, is big on the weaponry of all sides in the Second Unpleasantness, most particularly those of Perfidious Albion - where else will you find the Blacker Bombard or the Preying Mantis lauded and not excoriated? - and yet this device is one I had not heard of until yesteryon. One reason is because it was used primarily as a naval defence weapon, and Conrad is a creature of terra firma. We are talking of none other than the 'Holman Projector'. Art!
This was an ad-hoc weapon dreamed up in 1940 by the Holman company, who dealt with pneumatic machinery. They posited that a weapon which used compressed air to launch it's projectiles would be more economical than one using various explosives, and they were right. The weapon was intended as a deterrent more than a destructive, with it's GREAT BIG GREASY GREY GOUTS OF GUNFIRE providing a reason for the Luftwaffe to keep well away from this undoubtedly lethal weapon -
Except not really. Rather incredibly, some Teuton aircraft were in fact shot down by the Holman, which is akin to disabling a tank with a rubber band, some beeswax and a copper coin. It did it's duty of persuading Luftwaffe crews that the Perfidious Albions were using zombie-gas-triffid warfare against them, so causing attacks on shipping to occur at Safely Yet Inaccurately Heights. Art!
"Bet I can drink more than <hic> you!"
The most interesting thing about the Holman was that it could accept ANY object of sufficient width to be accommodated by the barrel. This happened to be of material interest when Sir Winston turned up at a test trial, for the Army had neglected to supply Pattern 36 hand grenades as explosive payload. Instead, they used beer bottles, which were a handy fit, presumably after Winnie and Co. had drained them. The effective impact was only slightly diminished by not having explosives involved. There are several (probably apocryphal) stories about how the Holman was used to fire a barrage of raw potatoes at incoming Teuton aircraft, which you might categorise as Whizzer and Chips. Art!
No, no, I asked for it. I shall Tazer myself.
Of course this led to Your Humble Scribe reminiscing about spud guns. Conrad reminiscing about anything is liable to come to a bad end and this is no exception.
A Long Time Forward, In A Galway Far, Far Away -
Heh. As we have proven on many occasions, Rob's* Conrad's memory is retentive, if not exactly filed properly. Thus he recalled a story from "Judge Dredd" where Old Stoneyface had been working abroad, in the Emerald Isle, which has a justice system significantly less harsh than that of Mega-City One. Irish Judges, for one, enjoy a pint or two of Guinness when off-duty, and they are inclined to turn a blind eye to EVIL CRIMINAL TRANSGRESSING PERPETRATORS every now and then. Okay, okay, on duty as well. Art!
Behold a victim of the 'Spud Gun', which, we are told, began to be used in Ireland when actual metal-and-chemical ammunition got too expensive. Conrad raises an eyebrow at the irony on show. Art!
Death by pommes frites <shudders> - and no gravy! Of course, the pedantic hair-splitters out there will already be calculating velocity and density and square footage of impact, versus wind resistance and occipital shear velocity, divided by Maris Piper. Well, there is always the blanket bloodbath approach -
There is undoubtedly an analysis just begging to be carried out as to whether a flood of hot fluid potato can kill, or not. Watch this space. Motley! how fast can you peel a pound of potatoes with the world's smallest parer?
Electron microscope image of 2.3 nanometres length parer
Fighting Fyre With Fire
For Lo! we are talking dreadful music festivals, and most of the developed world has sniggered in knowing disdain at that farrago in the Caribbean, where all those 'influencers' and 'enablers' turned out to be the basest of money-grubbing liars.
Well, spare a thought from those swanning about in the sun, sand and surf of the Caribbean, to those swanning about a septic September South Canadian swamp 45 years earlier. For Lo! we are back on the Erie Canal Soda Pop Festival once more. Conrad found a great video on Youtube about it. Art!
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| Find me a smile amongst them |
This was an event that grew out of an earlier, successful, one in Evansville, Indiana. The mayor and other upstanding citizens didn't want diseased, drugged-up, half-naked hippies in town again, so they BANNED the festival. All the neighbouring counties also BANNED THE DIRTY HIPPIES. BAN BAN BAN!
It didn't stop the festival. The promoters found a bit of Illinois that projected into Indiana, so no injunctions or bans. It was remote from both Illinois and Indiana, so - only three police officers on site. Art!
The promoters, thinking themselves canny, waited until the last second to announce where the festival was taking place, thus avoiding another Indiana injunction. However, leaving it so late meant they never managed to ship kit from their original festival site to the new one.
Thus. One toilet for every 46,000 people.
When The Cinque Ports Were Sink Ports
Conrad, lest you be unaware, is following the fortunes of Squire Nigel Loring as he potters and prospers in the late fourteenth century, having come of late to the port of Winchelsea. Art!
Sir N has been made aware that the town he sees before himself is all new, because the original was overthrown by the ocean in 1367 (?), and it now lies beneath the sandbanks of the English Channel. Well, you never know, when people are able to start diving again, who knows what will be unearthed?
Finally -
We need less than nothing here, as the Compositional Ton has already been reached. Thus, let me put forward President Bierce as the next incumbent!
* IGNORE THIS NAME! Seriously, it never happened. And if it did, don't forget - the Remote Nuclear Detonator stands ever ready.
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